1. Field of the Invention
The present general inventive concept relates to a medium supplying unit to supply a printing medium and an image forming apparatus having the same, and more particularly, to a medium supplying unit to lock the position of a loading plate when loading a printing medium and an image forming apparatus having the same.
2. Description of the Related Art
An image forming apparatus performs a printing operation for forming image data received from a host as a visible image on a printing medium by using a developer or an ink. For this, the image forming apparatus includes a medium supplying unit to which a plurality of printing mediums are loaded, and the medium supplying unit supplies the loaded printing mediums one by one in a printing operation.
A medium supplying unit employed by a conventional image forming apparatus includes a cassette frame detachably coupled to a main body frame, and a loading plate rotatably disposed at the cassette frame and loading a printing medium. Also, an elastic member is interposed between the loading plate and a surface of the cassette frame, and a latch configuration to overcome an elastic force of the elastic member to lock the position of the loading plate is provided.
With this configuration, if a user mounts the cassette frame to the main body frame after loading printing media on the loading plate locked by the latch, the locking by the latch is withdrawn, and accordingly, the loading plate upwardly rotates to a supplying position of the printing media by the elastic member.
However, the conventional medium supplying unit for the image forming apparatus forms the above latch configuration by assembling various components such as a latch, a stopper, a spring, etc. Since the separate components are respectively manufactured and assembled, manufacturing costs and processes increase, and tolerance among the components should be taken into consideration in designing the components. Also, if the number of components increases, since the configuration thereof becomes complicated, it is apt to be out of order.
In the conventional latch configuration, the spring is provided. Since the elastic force of the spring decreases as time elapses, operation of the latch configuration may fail to be stably performed.